


if you pick a rose

by peachii



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-09
Updated: 2017-08-09
Packaged: 2018-12-13 09:19:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 972
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11756778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peachii/pseuds/peachii
Summary: If Lance had known the Shiro they rescued from the galra cruiser two weeks ago was not their Shiro, he would have never left Keith’s side.But he did.And Keith wouldn’t be coming home because of it.In which Keith dies, but Lance is given a second chance to save him - if he can only find a fault in his killer.





	if you pick a rose

**Author's Note:**

> I call this "peachii's bullshit excuse to write my take on Kuron and ship him with everyone",,  
> Ok but really, I know I should not be starting another work. Believe me. Season 3 really hyped me up, though, so this is my way of coping until October.. 
> 
> Warning for major character death (which will be reserved in Chapter 2, but I'm leaving a warning anyways)

**Day Zero**

 

When Lance was little, he often picked flowers from his mother’s garden.  He wasn’t particularly keen on the scolding he received afterwards, with a bundle of lilacs held tight against his chest and indigo eyes glaring down at the soil his rain boots had churned.

He didn’t understand that flowers died when you picked them - or that it wasn’t fair to the flower, to steal away its life simply because you thought it looked more beautiful clasped in your hand.

Sometimes, he found himself wondering if Death was also a child, just as he had once been.  Perhaps He was not capable of comprehending the fault in taking the life of someone with pretty sterling grey eyes and a blinding smile.  

It wasn’t love.

It wasn’t even a friendship.

All he ever wanted was for Keith to look at him the same way he looked at Shiro - with admiration, and a plump but somewhat chapped smile.  

Lance began to slowly notice the developement between them as the months went by like broken fragments.  

Perhaps they weren’t friends.  But maybe they didn’t have to be enemies, either. It occurred to him that he could be something other than a thorn in Keith’s side.

...Maybe he could get Keith to look at him with something other than malice.  

He thought there would be more time.  But if there was anything Lance had learned in the midst of a war, it was that time didn’t spare a moment for anyone.  And it loved Death more than itself.

“ _Stay with me_.”  

He knew he was speaking, but the words failed to reach his own ears.

“ _Keith, come on.  Stay with me._ ”

There was so much red.  It stained his clothes, his hands, his face - and none of it his own.  

He desperately wished it was.

There was a rose garden blooming in Keith’s chest, and it wouldn’t stop.  

He roused a soft breathe from its weakening gardener, but it was faint.  Keith’s chapped lips suddenly looked so much paler than he remembered.

A red and a blue helmet rested beside them, both battered.  He could hear muffled static and the occasional voice coming from them; the team, no doubt, demanding what had become of their teammates.

It was supposed to be an easy mission; a quick scouting of an abandoned planet that held recent and blurry footage of a rebel who looked like Matt Holt.  _“Keith and Lance, you’ll come with me,”_ Shiro had said.  Just hearing their newly returned leader say Lance’s name had filled him with a sense of gratification so great he didn’t stop to consider that Shiro would never leave the castle this defensiveness for an easy mission.

Eventually, there began the bickering.

And the arguing.

And then the yelling.

All the while, Shiro had watched helplessly, only making the occasional attempt to ease the bristling boys.  He should have known, that Shiro would do more than softly beg them to calm down.  He was never one to tolerate that sort of behavior.

Lance didn’t, though.  Instead, he stormed off in one direction, while Keith in the other.  Shiro had followed after Keith, which only infuriated the new Red paladin further.  

If Lance had known the Shiro they rescued from the galra cruiser two weeks ago was not their Shiro, he would have never left Keith’s side.  

But he did.

And Keith wouldn’t be coming home because of it.

“I’m sorry,” the raven-haired boy continued, but he sounded distant now.  His voice was barely a rasp.  “I’m sorry, what I said.  I didn’t mean..I didn’t mean it…”

“Stop it,” Lance scolded, ignoring the warm rivers coursing his face.  Keith’s own face distorted, blurred by his tears.  “Stop talking like you - _stop it_.  I can fix this.  We’re fine.  You’re fine.”

But a flower picked was a flower lost.

Keith died quietly, cradled in Lance’s arms.

 

He lay him down gently, then stood painted in the blood of a boy who had died far too young - and at the hands of someone Keith had trusted most.

Shiro stood rigid a few feet away, long tendrils of black and white hair framing his face in un-kept waves.  His eyes were wide with horror, his jaw slack, as he looked upon Keith’s still form.  

“You aren’t Shiro,” Lance concluded, hollowly.  

The man who looked like Shiro swallowed, hard.  He didn’t look away from Keith, not even as he found the voice to speak: “Is he…?”

“He trusted you.”  Lance could feel the rage and grief bubbling inside of him, ready to overflow like a frothing waterfall.  “He _loved_ you.”

The killer put up his hands, and the rage surged within Lance as he saw his palms painted with Keith’s blood.  “Lance, you have to believe me.  I - I don’t know what happened.  I blacked out.  I would never...Keith…”  His voice trailed off, and he seemed to choke on his own words.   “Oh my god, Keith…”

He brought his bloodied hands to his head, letting it hang as his breaths grew shallow.  “I keep hearing a name in my mind.  Kuron. _Kuron_ …”

Lance didn’t think.

He took three long strides towards the fake Shiro, _Kuro_ , and swung.

Kuron was ready for him.  He released his head with enough time to snatch Lance’s hand before it made impact on his jaw.  Lance began to struggle and spit in his grip.  When he met Shiro’s eyes, they were no longer wide and panicked.  Instead, they were murky.  Dead.

They were the same eyes that had watched without remorse as he plunged his blade into his Keith.

Kuron drew back a fist with his galra-tech arm, and Lance saw white.

His last thought was of Keith - the way he looked so broken up as he bled out into Lance’s arms.

 _He deserved so much better._  


**Author's Note:**

> scream with or at me:  
> [twitter](https://twitter.com/peachii_keef)  
> [tumblr](http://peachiikeenteen.tumblr.comf)  
> 


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